Just Like Home Residency residency aims to create time, space, and networks for emerging and mid-career interdisciplinary artists interested in developing and sharing their ideas communally and collaboratively. Inspired by the “empowerment’ model” to engage with participating artists, as described by Samra Mayanja* by “encouraging, facilitating, [and] holding space for personal and collective reflection and realization”. There will be an emphasis on active listening and asking direct questions that provide a self-critical structure and an openness to experimentation. A core intention of the residency is for artists to connect with and work alongside other artists mindfully.
Artists-in-Residence:
Ximena Velázquez aka La PosmoBaby [she/they] is an interdisciplinary artist, DJ, and community organizer originally from the southeast of Mexico. As an artist, her works blend various mediums, focusing on installation, audiovisual media, and textiles, exploring themes such as longing and belonging, immigration, and queerness. As a DJ, La PosmoBaby hosts Caricias, a monthly radio show that celebrates femmes and enbies within the local music scene. She is also a co-founder of Gateo, a DJ collective organizing nightlife events dedicated to the queer Latinx diaspora.
Lydia Pourmand [she/they] is a queer, mixed Iranian interdisciplinary designer currently residing on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. Lydia seamlessly merges design with technology, drawing from a diverse background that includes motion design, gaming, AR, blockchain, immersive installations, and entertainment. Dedicated to creating with purpose and working with intention, Lydia is committed to using her skills to unite art and technology for the collective benefit of her communities. They actively stand against exploitative practices within this intersection, striving to make a positive impact through her work.
Julia Wong [they/she] is a Chinese diasporic arts and culture worker on the unceded lands of the Unceded Sḵwx̱ wú7mesh (Squamish), səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), xʷməθkʷəy̓ əm (Musqueam) territories. They graduated from the University of British Columbia with a Bachelor of Fine Arts with a focus on Visual Arts and English Literature. They now work in program administration at a non-profit serving SRO tenants in the Downtown Eastside and Chinatown. They are interested in art as a site for disruption, history-making, and spiritual practice. Their artistic concerns have included the intersection of craft and labour, cultural reckoning/bastardization, and decay/regeneration.
Malivia Khondaker [they/them] is an artist, wizard, writer, and animorph based on Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-waututh territory, unlawfully occupied by the Canada corporation. Their ancestors might answer to being called মানুষ, народ, or to dinner. Maliv makes art to ask questions about the way things are, were, can, and will be. They are interested in textiles, borders, and stories. ACAB!